Posted on 07 January 2009 | No Comment

After reading through every entry to her “Miss Universe” ContestRuby Veridiano-Ching has selected a winner! Hailing from Florida State University, Marisa Munnings won a copy of Ruby’s book, “Miss Universe” and a pair of the exclusive earrings designed by Ruby herself, and created by the ladies of Made Jewelry. Here’s what Ruby had to say about selecting Marisa as the winner:

It was such a difficult choice to make because we had so many beautiful and poignant contest entries, but this one hit me the most. I felt like it was represented really well for the teenage female psyche, and definitely aligned with the sentiments and ideas I expressed in Miss Universe- Miss Universe is a testament for the female heart, thought, emotion, and strength, and I think this piece embodied that.

Thank-you to all that entered the contest! Read Marisa Munnings winning poem, entitled “Baby Girl” after the jump!

Baby Girl

When
Baby girls grow
They supposed to know they’re infinite
Transcend beyond scabbed knees to
Ice skating dreams and
Selling lemonade to
Fortune 500 shade
And
Baby girls dream bout many things
Baby girl wanna sing
Baby girl wanna dance
Baby girl wanna act
And home harbors just enough steam to fuel all these dreams into
Make shift semi realities
And baby girls be satisfied with that
Cause in her moments
At any given minute
Baby girl can be full fledged woman in any dream
Turn a sun ray into any laser beam
And scream and laugh at the power that is she
For baby girls, that’s how stuff be

But baby girls leave home
And all her infinitesimal strength known in her original domain
Dissipate like rain when she’s away
No matter what the phone calls say she
Ain’t no better than so-and who’s baby girl
That fills her world with prissy bougise stuff
And there’s enough whispers tell baby girl to follow suit
It’s only times when she gets to recoup that she knows
Her place is beyond all that
But what happens when
Away, baby girls dreams don’t materialize like that
And so many rules
And ramifications
And self induced hesitations
Come into play
Ain’t much for baby girls to say

Baby girls, thus, get grown accordingly
Gotta make homes of their own
Set paths that are righteous, you see
And they must put on heirs
Dreams get detached from living
And ain’t no
Make-shift semi realities in reader’s digest
Or Essence or Ebony
That personifies the life in me
Or baby girls, I meant to say
Now twice removed from games they played
Baby girl gotta deal with the today she been dealt
And personification ain’t never felt this flat
And in her dreams she ain’t notice the
Bills that stack
The times to slack
The things dreams lack
In their entirety
But real baby girls say
“That won’t be the life of me”

Real baby girls never lose that grip
On
Who they was
They can’t slip into
That grown up mind set
To only reach for what’s at arm stretch
Because it’s easy
That equates a death to baby girl
So with her cunning instinct,
Baby girls turn
Make-shift semi realties
Into full fledged solid audacity to
Challenge the real world to
Fill in the lines of her dreams
Fulfill what it needs for her to
Dance or
Sing or
Act
No matter what the vision may be
Reality must remove its “can’t”s and “maybes”
Hopeful, persistent and clever
Baby girls should stay that way forever
And I may not get grown and sexy
But I can charge it to the game
Because I know it’ll make a better me